1 Samuel 25:29-39

29 If anyone stands in your way, if anyone tries to get you out of the way, Know this: Your God-honored life is tightly bound in the bundle of God-protected life; But the lives of your enemies will be hurled aside as a stone is thrown from a sling.

30 "When God completes all the goodness he has promised my master and sets you up as prince over Israel,

31 my master will not have this dead weight in his heart, the guilt of an avenging murder. And when God has worked things for good for my master, remember me."

32 And David said, "Blessed be God, the God of Israel. He sent you to meet me!

33 And blessed be your good sense! Bless you for keeping me from murder and taking charge of looking out for me.

34 A close call! As God lives, the God of Israel who kept me from hurting you, if you had not come as quickly as you did, stopping me in my tracks, by morning there would have been nothing left of Nabal but dead meat."

35 Then David accepted the gift she brought him and said, "Return home in peace. I've heard what you've said and I'll do what you've asked."

36 When Abigail got home she found Nabal presiding over a huge banquet. He was in high spirits - and very, very drunk. So she didn't tell him anything of what she'd done until morning.

37 But in the morning, after Nabal had sobered up, she told him the whole story. Right then and there he had a heart attack and fell into a coma.

38 About ten days later God finished him off and he died.

39 When David heard that Nabal was dead he said, "Blessed be God who has stood up for me against Nabal's insults, kept me from an evil act, and let Nabal's evil boomerang back on him."

1 Samuel 25:29-39 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO FIRST SAMUEL 25

This chapter gives an account of the death of Samuel, and of the ill treatment David met with from Nabal; it begins with the death of Samuel, which was greatly lamented in Israel, 1Sa 25:1; it draws the character of Nabal, and his wife, 1Sa 25:2,3; records a message of David to him, by his young men, desiring he would send him some of his provisions made for his sheep shearers, 1Sa 25:4-9; and Nabal's ill-natured answer to him reported by the young men, which provoked David to arm against him, 1Sa 25:10-13,21,22; and this being told Abigail, the wife of Nabal, and a good character given of David and his men, and of the advantage Nabal's shepherds had received from them, and the danger his family was in through his ingratitude, 1Sa 25:14-17; she prepared a present to pacify David, went with it herself, and addressed him in a very handsome, affectionate, and prudent manner, 1Sa 25:18-31; and met with a kind reception, 1Sa 25:32-35; and the chapter is closed with an account of the death of Nabal, and of the marriage of Abigail to David, 1Sa 25:32-44.